FIFA partners raise concern over World Cup bid allegations

Tariq Panja

RIO DE JANEIRO - Sony, Adidas and Visa, three of FIFA's biggest corporate partners, expressed concern about more allegations of impropriety in connection with how soccer's governing body awarded the 2022 World Cup to Qatar.

"The negative tenor of the public debate around FIFA at the moment is neither good for football nor for FIFA and its partners," Adidas said. Sony said it expects FIFA "to adhere to its principles."

The companies issued statements after the London-based Sunday Times published allegations for a second week against Qatar's surprising World Cup winning bid in December 2010. The newspaper says documents and emails leaked by an unidentified senior FIFA official show Qatar's former FIFA Vice President Mohamed bin Hammam paid millions of dollars to soccer officials around the world to secure their backing for Qatar to host the 2022 event. Qatar denies the allegations.

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"As a FIFA partner, we expect these allegations to be investigated appropriately," Sony's Tokyo-based spokesman George Boyd said Sunday in an emailed statement. "We continue to expect FIFA to adhere to its principles of integrity, ethics and fair play across all aspects of its operation."

FIFA is in contact with commercial partners including Adidas, Sony and Visa, said Thierry Weil, FIFA's marketing director.

"They have 100 percent confidence in the investigation currently being conducted by FIFA's independent Ethics Committee," Weil said in an emailed statement Sunday. "Our sponsors have not requested anything that is not covered by the ongoing investigation."

Since the December 2010 choice of Qatar, which beat competition from the U.S., Australia, South Korea and Japan, allegations have dogged the Arab country and several officials.

Michael Garcia, a former U.S. federal prosecutor who has been investigating the claims for more than a year, said last week he'll file a report next month to German judge Hans-Joachim Eckert, who'll decide if there is a case. Eckert presides over the adjudicatory arm of FIFA's ethics committee.

"We expect FIFA will take the appropriate actions to respond to the report and its recommendations," said Melissa Cassar, a spokeswoman for Visa, in an email. "We will continue to monitor its internal investigation."

Garcia will address FIFA's members at its annual meeting in Sao Paulo this week. The 2014 World Cup in Brazil starts a day after the meeting's close on June 12.

Bin Hammam, who in 2011 withdrew as the only candidate to challenge Sepp Blatter for FIFA's presidency after being accused of offering bribes to Caribbean voters, said in a phone message last week he didn't want to comment on the allegations reported by the Sunday Times.

FIFA's top partners, with the exception of Sony, have committed to backing the 2018 and 2022 World Cups, with Adidas signing on through to 2030. World Cup-related sponsorship brought in $404 million in 2013, according to FIFA's annual statement.

BP, whose Castrol unit is a World Cup sponsor, expects FIFA "to deal with this issue in the right and proper manner," said Sheila Williams, a spokeswoman, by telephone. "We are concentrating our efforts" on the current World Cup.